The Queensland couple defying the typical family holiday
Katie grew up on Brisbane’s southside and remembers spending her childhood “wandering around the bush” with her brothers.
“I was very outdoorsy. I walked everywhere, I loved exercising, and I loved the beach,” she says.
His spinal cord was injured in a car accident when he was only 16 years old. He spent the next nine months at the Princess Alexandra Hospital in Brisbane, learning to use a wheelchair and living without the use of half his body.
“This was a quick introduction to the world of disability and adulthood,” says Katie.
Two years after the accident he bought the property in Woodford and began camping by the river; He has not abandoned this passion since then.
Jimmy is a country boy by nature and hails from Collinsville, a rural town located about 90 kilometers inland from Bowen in northern Queensland. He worked estates and rode bulls at rodeos before injuring his spinal cord in a car accident at age 21.
“Me and another guy were heading into town for the weekend and he hit a pothole, lost control and rolled over. [the car]“It was quite an ordeal,” says Jimmy.
The couple first met at Princess Alexandra Hospital, where Katie was working as a peer support worker and Jimmy was recovering from his accident.
Like Katie, Jimmy struggled with the double “shell shock” of being paralyzed from the waist down in PAH’s spinal unit for eight months., and moving from country Queensland to a big city.
“You’re 21 and you’re still very young, so you can’t really understand or understand life,” he says.
“I’ve always worked on properties but I didn’t know if it was something I’d ever go back to. I also thought I’d never be able to drive a 4WD again.”
The pair met in hospital while Jimmy was recovering and Katie was working as a peer support worker in the spinal unit. They reconnected five years later and began dating, giving birth to their daughter in 2017 and getting married the following year.
A typical camping setup for the Hammonds.
The Hammond family, along with Katie’s two older children, spend their holidays camping, like many Queensland families. Jimmy says they made concessions.
“The opportunity to do something different is always on the board,” says Jimmy.
“For me, camping has always meant disconnecting from the world and going somewhere with no phone service, fishing on the river and finding that quiet serenity.
“I sit around with kids involved these days and think: Big4 Holiday Parks. They’re amazing.”
Now a Spinal Life peer support team leader, Katie advocates for other people with disabilities to explore the outdoors.
Katie and Jimmy have camped in tent and caravan parks across the state, from remote crocodile-haunted beaches to rural towns, and they want to show others with spinal cord injuries and physical disabilities that the typical Queensland holiday is possible.
“It’s a matter of figuring out what it is that interests you and what things need to be put in place to make that happen,” says Katie.
“What does this destination mean for you and your disability? What equipment will you need to take with you?”
“You have to find what you love to do, and camping can be anything. You can camp, you can glamp, you can find a cabin. You can do it however you want.”
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